8 Sep 2019
23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C
When engaged couples come in to see about getting married, it’s
my job to say, “Congratulations, that’s wonderful…and now let’s sit down and
talk about a few things first.” And it
isn’t the wedding day that I want to talk about…yet. Instead, we talk about things they might not
have thought about yet; personal, relational, practical things that come with being
married.
For example, we send them to workshops where they talk about
finances. How are they going to handle
that? Who’s going to make sure the bills
get paid? Are they going to work on a
budget together? Do they know what a
budget is? And the couple is made to
address things like “conflict resolution;” what do they do when they get irritated
with each other? Is there resolution and
compromise? Is just one person always
bending to keep the peace?
The engaged couples are made to do what Jesus is talking
about in the gospel. Before they get
married, they’re made to sit down and consider the “cost” of being married—not
the expense of the wedding, but the personal cost to each of them in living
married life. And they do that—not as a
hoop to jump through, but to get them off on a good path.
Before someone builds a tower, Jesus says, they first sit
down and see how much it’s going to cost.
And, of course, that’s a no-brainer.
But it’s also the wise thing to do.
Before you go buy a new lawnmower, you first ask: Do I have enough money
to pay for this? Even with credit cards,
you still want to ask: Can I handle this expense on my credit card? Am I going to be able to pay it off? It’s smart to think about that. It’s smart.
It’s...wise.
When the Lord talks about the cost of discipleship, he’s not
saying: “Be my disciple, no matter the cost.”
That would be foolish. Instead,
he’s saying: “Here’s the cost of being my disciple: you’re going to have to bear
the weight of your cross, and you’re going to have to put me first in your
life—not to the exclusion of others, not in opposition to that Fourth
Commandment to honor your father and your mother—but with me as first in your
life. That’s the cost of being my
disciple. If you’re not able to handle
that cost, then don’t pretend to follow me—for your own good.”
And we can infer this by the examples he gives to the
people. The first is the tower building
project. He’s saying, essentially, that
the wise person won’t (shouldn’t) build it if they already know they won’t have
enough to finish it. In our efforts to
help build the Kingdom of God, Jesus is saying: “Before you jump into a project
in the parish, or the diocese, or wherever, first stop; stop and consider the ‘cost’—not
only the financial cost, but the human cost as well; the availability of
volunteers, the time you have available, people’s general interest in the
project.”
“Consider all that,” Jesus says, “so your work to build my
Kingdom will have the best chance for…success.”
“But if the cost is too high,” Jesus says, “or if the human and other
resources are not available, then do not start.” “Be wise, and know your limits; plan for
success, not failure,” he says.
Or there’s the example of the king going into battle. Now being a Christian can certainly be an
uphill climb. And to that Jesus says,
“Look ahead. Can you handle the cost—the
human, spiritual, and emotional cost—of being a Christian ‘soldier’ in the
world?” “If you can’t,” Jesus says,
“then it would be foolish to put on a suit of armor.” “It’s far better,” he says, “to make peace
with the reality of the situation, and to do the best you can.” And that’s not foolish or complacent; it’s
simply being wise.
Last week we heard about the importance of humility; being
“grounded in the reality” of who and what we are; fully accepting both our
strengths and our weaknesses, our abilities and our inabilities. “It would be wiser,” Jesus says, “not to be
my disciple than to risk being a Christian in name only; that is, a hypocrite.” Again, Jesus wants us to be successful, however
that looks, rather than to jump foolishly into failure and frustration. “Be humble, be wise,” he says.
It’s like the weather.
Jesus said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west you
say immediately that it is going to rain—and so it does; and when you notice
that the wind is blowing from the south you say that it is going to be hot—and
so it is” [Lk 12:54]. In other words, we
know how to be wise; we know how to look ahead so we’ll be ready for the
weather. And we should do the same with
faith and the Lord. He’s very clear
about the cost of discipleship. But how
do we respond to that cost…humbly and wisely?
This seems to get at the idea of our “vocation,” our
calling—not only individually, but as families, as a community of faith. Saint Paul says, “There are many parts of the
one body” [1 Cor 12:12], and we each have some part to play in that body. And the part we play is built on the reality
of who we are: our personal strengths, our personal limits.
In the Scriptures, there are several ways that people are in
relation to Jesus. Some are apostles;
people who are not only followers and disciples of the Lord, but are also his
spokesmen; leaders of people, sent out into the world. Some people are evangelists; who are also
followers and disciples, but also preachers and writers of the good news. Some people are teachers, who are, again, followers
and disciples, but charged with passing on the faith in the synagogue, at home
with the children.
There are the disciples—lots of them; students of the Lord
who commit themselves to learning from Jesus, who commit themselves to putting
Jesus first in their lives and carrying their daily cross as best they
can. And, then, in Scripture, there are
“the crowds;” people who are intrigued by Jesus and touched by him; who love
Jesus and have faith in him, but who don’t necessarily have the strength or the
ability to pick up the cross. Jesus has
mercy on them; he goes around healing them, bringing the Kingdom of God to
them.
Finally, in Scripture, there’s “everybody else”; people who
have little use for Jesus—either that or they just hate him. When Jesus lays out for us the cost of
discipleship, it seems to get at this question of vocation; because our
vocation is directly tied to the strengths and weakness, potentials and limitations
God has given each of us.
What abilities has God given me? What level of spiritual endurance has God
blessed me with? Whatever it is, we know
there’s a limit. After all, God didn’t
create us to be superhuman. It’s like our
money—even the richest person in the world has…a limit. In following Jesus, he asks us, essentially,
to live within our limits; to live within the means that he himself gave us. But to find those limits, we have to be
tested, we have to stop and consider the cost of things and whether or not we
can handle that cost.
During Saint Paul’s conversion, in between the day when God
knocked him to the ground, and the day he started preaching the gospel, Saint
Paul spend three years in the Arabian desert.
He was out there to see what his personal, physical, and spiritual
limits were. Only when he knew that he
could handle the cost of being an apostle did he go and live that life. He came out of that desert very wise, ready
for success (knowing his limits), and with happiness in the heart.
It’s why we have surveys in the parish from time to time. There might have an idea for something in the
parish, but if the cost is too high, then we won’t go with the idea. Right now, there’s the idea of having Fish
Fries in Lent. But the primary cost of
that isn’t the fish (or the french fries or the coleslaw); the primary cost is
volunteers. It takes a lot of people to
run a fish fry for five weeks. If we
don’t have enough “volunteers in the bank,” so to speak, then we won’t do a fish
fry. And that’s just the wise thing to
do. After all, who wants to spend five weeks
of frustration in the kitchen because there weren’t enough volunteers to begin
with?
Now, as we know, “with God all things are possible.” But, of course, we are not God. And it’s very frustrating and foolish to try
to be God. With God all things are
possible—as long as it’s in the mind of God to begin with. But, as the Book of Wisdom says, “Who can
know the mind of God?” We certainly have
a limitation there…which is a good thing.
Limits and weaknesses are blessings from God. They give us parameters for being our truest,
best self for others and God.
And that’s what the Lord simply asks of us; he asks us to
“live within our limits;” to spend ourselves for love of him and for all that’s
good, true, and beautiful—but within the limits and abilities he himself has
given us. Picture the widow’s mite. It the eyes of others, she didn’t give all
that much. In reality, though, she gave
herself to God…right up to her limit.
And, in the eyes of God, that was everything. And he loved her, and she was happy.
What matters to God is that we give our best to him—not my
neighbor’s best, but “my” best. And having
the wisdom to know our limits—and using the strength to live up to those limits—is
how we give our best. And that makes for
success and happiness with others, with God, and ourselves (this side of
heaven): giving our best to God—no less and…no more.
